Commercial use of “privacy” window in automobiles and/or architectural applications has become more popular over the years. Such glasses are sometimes formed from a standard soda-lime-silica glass composition to which is added various colorants designed to achieve desired color and spectral properties. Desired spectral properties include low visible light transmission (Lta), low infrared (IR) transmission, and/or low ultraviolet (UV) transmission, with these terms being defined as follows:                Lta as visible light transmission,        UV as ultraviolet light transmission, and        IR as infrared light transmission.        
One conventional privacy glass is known as “Venus 10.” Venus 10 is believed to have the following colorant portion and spectral characteristics at a thickness of about 4 mm:
Ingredient/SpectralAmount/Valuetotal iron: 2.693% (wt. %)cobalt oxide:0.0277% (wt. %)chromium oxide:0.0012% (wt. %)Lta10.24%% UV 1.35%% IR1.76% FeO0.9243Dom. λ (nm)490Ex. Purity, %22.07L* (D65)40.57a*−15.6b*−4.49
While Venus 10 has good color and desirable low visible (Lta), IR, and UV transmission characteristics, it is problematic in that it requires too much total iron (total iron herein is referred to as Fe2O3), namely about 2.693%. This high amount of total iron is undesirable in that it typically requires a special shallow tank to be used for melting the same (a high amount of total iron is difficult to efficiently melt during the process of glass manufacture on a consistent basis).
Another privacy glass for use in automotive applications is described in commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 5,932,502 to Longobardo et. al. While the privacy glass of the '502 Patent has desirable visible (Lta), IR and UV transmission characteristics less than 20%, the '502 glass is undesirable in that it requires a rather large amount of total iron in certain examples (e.g., 1.15% or higher in Examples 1-14 not using boric acid). Moreover, the '502 glass requires the use of significant amounts of Se and Cr in order to achieve the desired privacy characteristics.
While the use of amber glass is known for beer bottle applications, such glass compositions typically do not have a combination of satisfactory visible, UV and IR transmission characteristics.
In view of the above, it is apparent that there exists a need in the art for a new glass composition and/or method of making the same which enables low visible, IR and/or UV transmission characteristics to be achieved (a) without needing an undesirably large amount of total iron, and/or (b) without requiring significant amounts of Se, Cr, Er and/or Ni in certain example embodiments.